“If you'll drive me home I think I can show you,” I said.
So he went over to my house in his dog-cart with the retriever; and on the way I told him the story of Garm.
“I was wondering where that brute had gone to. He's the best dog in the regiment,” said my friend. “I offered the little fellow twenty rupees for him a month ago. But he's a hostage, you say, for Stanley's good conduct. Stanley's one of the best men I have when he chooses.”
“That's the reason why,” I said. “A second-rate man wouldn't have taken things to heart as he has done.”
We drove in quietly at the far end of the garden, and crept round the house. There was a place close to the wall all grown about with tamarisk trees, where I knew Garm kept his bones. Even Vixen was not allowed to sit near it. In the full Indian moonlight I could see a white uniform bending over the dog.
“Good-bye, old man,” we could not help hearing Stanley's voice. “For 'Eving's sake don't get bit and go mad by any measley pi-dog. But you can look after yourself, old man. You don't get drunk an' run about 'ittin' your friends. You takes your bones an' you eats your biscuit, an' you kills your enemy like a gentleman. I'm goin' away—don't 'owl—I'm goin' off to Kasauli, where I won't see you no more.”
I could hear him holding Garm's nose as the dog threw it up to the stars.
“You'll stay here an' be'ave, an'—an' I'll go away an' try to be'ave, an' I don't know 'ow to leave you. I don't know—”
“I think this is damn silly,” said the officer, patting his foolish fubsy old retriever. He called to the private, who leaped to his feet, marched forward, and saluted.
“You here?” said the officer, turning away his head.